Detail slips on Chargers' GM search

Jimmy Raye on Tuesday was team's first interview

The Chargers are keeping private the details of their general manager search, the wish of team president Dean Spanos.

In a Wednesday conference call, their search consultant let one detail slip.

The team has already interviewed Jimmy Raye, its director of player personnel and only in-house candidate for the position, holding the interview Tuesday in San Diego. Ron Wolf made it known, unintentionally, in a Wednesday conference call with local reporters.

The former Packers GM spoke from his home in Jupiter, Fla.

Wolf was in San Diego the day before, he said, to help conduct a Tuesday interview of a potential A.J. Smith successor for general manager. At first, when asked directly if the person was Raye, Wolf shot down the attempt to learn the person's identity.

"I hope you guys understand that we're bound by the wishes of Dean Spanos," Wolf, 74, said. "I'd rather not say."

Raye is one of six known candidates for the position.

The other five come from outside the organization. They are, per sources and multiple reports, 49ers Director of Player Personnel Tom Gamble, Giants Director of College Scouting Marc Ross, Colts Vice President of Football Operations Tom Telesco, Falcons Director of Player Personnel David Caldwell, and Cardinals Vice President of Player Personnel Steve Keim.

Wolf was asked if any outside GM candidate has come to San Diego.

"Have any outside GM candidates come to San Diego, you said?" Wolf asked. "Not to my knowledge. Inside, outside — now, I know what you're doing with that. I mean, even I can figure that out sitting here. But not to my knowledge."

Spanos retained Wolf to join the search for the Chargers' next GM and head coach. Spanos relieved Smith and Norv Turner of their duties Monday morning.

It will be Spanos who decides who Smith's successor will be.

Wolf said "the plan" is then for the hired GM to decide the next head coach.

That GM will join the current hiring team in place, composed of Spanos, Wolf, Chargers Assistant GM Ed McGuire and John Spanos, director of college scouting.

Wolf, a very qualified and established NFL personnel man who served as Packers GM from 1991 to 2001, was asked respectfully, with retaining a search consultant not a common practice around the league, why they acquired his services and needed him.

"I’m not so sure they needed me," Wolf said. "I think the deal is that it is another ear, another voice and another thought process. They have been through this a little bit, and they would like to hear something new. When I went to Green Bay in 1992, they had the poorest record in the National Football League. I think if you’ll check it out now from 1992 right to this day, the team with the best record in the NFL is the Green Bay Packers.

"That might have had something to do with it, too. To me, despite all of the other stuff that goes on, there is one statistic that matters: winning or losing. That's the only statistic that matters. That might have had something to do with it.”

Wolf oversaw Green Bay when Mike Holmgren and Mike Sherman were hired as head coaches.

He said the key to make the best hire is interviewing as many candidates as possible, waiting for the one who steps in and "just knocks your socks off."

"That happened to me a couple of times," Wolf said. "It should have happened to me one more time. I had the guy right there, and I was too stupid to realize what I was hearing."